CBO: 24 Million Americans Could Lose Coverage by 2026

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has released their analysis and scoring of the American Health Care Act (AHCA), the republican plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. The report concludes that 24 million Americans will lose health coverage by 2026 if the bill were to pass. Of those 24 million, 14 million will lose coverage within the first year the bill is law.

This would cause the number of uninsured Americans to almost double from 28 million currently, to almost 52 million a decade from now.

Furthermore, the CBO predicted that the bill would save the federal government $337 billion over 10 years, a majority of which comes from $880 billion in Medicaid cuts, hurting access to care for millions of people who cannot afford coverage.

This comes after the Trump administration questioned the legitimacy of the non-partisan CBO, saying it had lost credibility because of its failure to accurately predict the number of people who would signup for coverage under and ACA exchange.

What this means for the bill is still up in the air. Senators and Representatives from both sides of the aisle have criticized the bill already, and this new may push those who were sitting on the fence to go against the bill. However, the debate over the bill has already started, and it has made its way out of two House of Representatives committees.

It should also be noted that the bill the CBO reviewed today will almost certainly not be the exact bill that becomes law if it does, in fact, pass the Senate. As the bill becomes law, provisions will be added and removed; and new ideas will come up. Also, as happened with the ACA Medicaid expansion, parts of the bill may be turned down by the Supreme Court.

As this law moves forward, be sure to come back to stay informed about the latest, and visit our new Facebook Group to join in on the discussion.